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Well, I finally did it: I achieved the impossible. I know I should be proud, but I feel kind of guilty, instead.

So, what’s the big impossible thing I did?

I killed an air plant.

How hard can it be to keep an air plant alive? Actually, don’t answer that; clearly it is hard for me.

I mean, how do you even do that? I understand that some of my plants have suffered under my care (or, I suppose, more accurately, my lack of care thereof):

I will admit that I have occasionally forgotten to water and sing to them on a regular basis. I don’t know if it’s the water, the singing or the combination of the two that keeps my plants thriving, but I don’t want to risk the lives of innocent vegetation to find out through empirical experimentation. Repotting happens roughly eighteen months — at the soonest — after it first looked necessary to repot the plant for its future well-being and viability.

But an air plant? How? It’s an air plant. It’s called that because it lives on air, for crying out loud. We have plenty of that in our condo and it requires no action on my part, which was sort of the idea. I mist it every few days, as per the instructions, and it’s been fine since Christmas, when it joined our happy home.

We got a second air plant (they hang in these cool little glass bubble-like thingys) on Valentine’s Day. I wonder if the first one died of a broken heart, thinking we’d grown weary of it. We didn’t, little air plant, I swear! We loved you! We gave you the best air we had!

I’d like to get a new air plant to replace him. Partly because it makes me sad and partly because the dead one kind of looks like a hideous spider and it’s freaking me out. All his legs are sticking up and everything. I gave up shopping for Lent, though (purchasing anything other than food), so here’s hoping that Adam feels compelled to replace him. Even Hermes feels bad for the little guy.

Seriously. How do you kill an air plant? Sigh…

NB: I just read up on air plant care and it turns out they do NOT live on air after all. Kind of misleading, actually. Still, though. I was watering it. I swear I watered it. HOW DID YOU DIE, LITTLE PLANT DUDE? Maybe it is the singing…

The way he quit his job became world news and I love that he did it in style, in integrity and in cake:

I love it. I mean, obviously, because it is cake, so of course I love it, but also that he’s following his passions and creating a life where he is doing what he loves to do. More of us should do that, I think. Which is why I’m working on it, too. It’s hard work, though (I know, “If I say so, right?”). If I lived over there, I’d buy his cakes and talk to him a lot, because I think it would inspire me.

No one ever said doing what you love is easy. I suppose if it were, a lot more people would be doing it. And I don’t know about you, but I find that if you are determined to find a way, people really love to remind you of all the things you should be worrying about, if you aren’t already, and as if you don’t have enough of your own stuff to get a handle on, too. I guess that’s their way of caring about you, but I suspect it also serves them by reinforcing the reasons to support the choices they’ve made.

Alan Watts talked about this in his clip “What if Money Was No Object”. This video is not new and I’ve posted it on Facebook often, usually when I’ve needed the reminder that I’m not crazy for wondering about the way we spend our lives (you know, the only lives we get).

Here’s what he said:

“But it’s absolutely stupid to spend your time doing things you don’t like, in order to go on spending [money on] things you don’t like, doing things you don’t like and to teach our children to follow in the same track.”

I mean, you guys? You get to live once. You don’t know how long you get, either. Unless you have some kind of inside track on living more than once and/or living forever, in which case, can you tell me how? Is how you’re spending your days what you dream of? I know there’s a disconnect for me in what I want to do and what I’m doing. Sometimes it makes me sad, other times frustrated, but lately in addition to those sentiments, it makes me dedicated, driven and committed to creating something different.

Just in case you needed some inspiration (and because I needed some today):

Do you even need to know what I’m referring to in that post title? I submit that you do not. But, just in case you really, really like raspberry (as do I my friend, as do I), I would like to tell you about a magical treat with which I have recently decided to eat in great quantity fallen in love.

Okay, you guys, get ready for it. You know Tim Horton’s raspberry-filled jelly donuts? YES YOU DO. DON’T EVEN TRY TO TELL ME YOU DON’T KNOW THEM, BECAUSE THEY ARE DELICIOUS.

Imagine that the delicious filling (c’mon, I know the filling’s really the only reason we eat the donut) has been tapped by the horn of a unicorn, sprinkled with pixie dust and fairy wishes (and also swirled with chocolate dreams, of course) and turned, as though by magic, into ice cream. That’s right. I said ice cream.

Yeah. RASPPLE-BERRY DELICIOUSNESS IN MAGICALRISHICAL ICE CREAM WONDERMENT (with a chocolate swirl, but who cares about that when there’s raspberry filling in your ice cream?).

Thank you, Island Farms (I think their dairy products taste better, because their cows are island cows and therefore happier cows. It’s like you can taste the happiness.).

Without further ado, I present to you Rocky Raspberry (though just in the picture, because I’m totally not sharing any of my ice cream. Sorry, but it’s too good and I already have to compete with Adam.):

You should get some of this. And then invite me over to “help” you with it.

Try it. You won’t be disappointed. Though I sort of hope you are, because then maybe you’ll give it to me… I would take it off your hands, because I’m a good friend and that is what friends do: They take it (“it” being ice cream) for the team.

Also, on Sunday night, something happened that’s never happened to me before: A pair of my Havaianas broke. Unwearably. Luckily, I wasn’t out walking in town or anything, because how gross would it be to walk barefoot downtown? (Clearly not so gross, according to a surprisingly high number of readers on my work blog who think it’s just fine to prance about with naked feet, whereas I think it’s decidedly Hepatitis C and lockjaw-inducingly not-fine)

Luckily, I have an unusually vast quantity of these kind of sandals (what? WHAT? HOW ARE YOU EVEN SURPRISED? THEY ARE SHOES, ARE THEY NOT?). But still. Still! That’s a first!

Like this:

I’m in Seattle again, and the TeamBucks isn’t full of its usual suspects. Granted, it’s Saturday, not Sunday. I will say, however, that there is a gentleman with amazing flowing locks. Very wavy, very long and very feminine. Other than that, he looks totally normal. I’m pretty sure he’s a wizard. Here’s my reasoning. And more proof. Long, flowing, greying hair = wizard. I’d take a picture, but I’m afraid he’d cast a spell on me. Or see me and think I was weird, at least.

Anyway.

It’s been a little while since we last hung out. Sorry about that, but I was a little busy, on a side trip to Breakdown City (sort of like Atlantic City, but less fun). If you’re ever wondering where I am, you can always check out Evergrowth. Actually, you should check it out anyway, since I’m writing there and more readership is always a good thing.

Anyway, to make up for it, I’ve got a real humdinger of a post for you today. I mean it. You’ll be happy you read it, though perhaps not while you’re eating your breakfast (consider that the disclaimer). It’s about the politics of litterboxes. Yup, I’m talking about poop. I know, I know: You don’t have to thank me. I’m happy to share with you some of the glamour that is my every [single freaking] day life.

As you know, we have two cats: Maui the Hairy and Hermes the Fat. Both cats are beloved in their own special way, but neither is particularly normal. Just what is normal, you ask? Well, I believe normal is, for a cat, snuggly and lovey.

Now, I’m sure you’re all saying, “But Bay, most of the cats I know are neither of those things.”

“Pshaw,” I say, “I didn’t finish.” Snuggly and lovey and very possibly scritchy if you linger near the sharp bits, which are inconveniently located at pretty much all ends of the beast, or pet the wrong spot. See? I’m not totally unrealistic.

I’ve gotten off point. Suffice it to say that my cats are patently not lapcats and never will be (although if ever one of them were to grace a lap, it would be Maui, believe it or not). The cuddly nature of my cats, or their deficiency in that quality is, however, not what I’m here to discuss today. We’re talking about their bathroom etiquette, or the lack thereof.

Maui has no manners and it contributes to mayhem. I feel like this clip pretty much says it all. Don’t worry, though: I’ll say more.

She looks regal. Don’t buy it.

Litterboxes are disgusting. I don’t feel like I really need to describe to you why that is the case. If you need proof, you’ve never owned a cat and I can’t help you with that. The litterbox is the one aspect of cat ownership that stinks, both figuratively and literally.

So apart from the fact that the litterbox is gross, it smells and there is kitty litter everywhere (E-v-e-r-y. Where.), it is also a problem because the temptation of the litterbox pushes Grimby past the point of rational thought. He thinks the litterbox is a fun and stinky vending machine. Seriously, he canNOT get enough of it.

Apparently, this is common. Because dogs are the grossest things ever. I mean, Grimby is cute and friendly and lovey and cuddly and hilarious and I adore him, but seriously; he pees on himself every single day/pee and he eats kitty litter (and anything it contains). You’ve seen nothing until you’ve seen a Boston Terrier come to sit very close to you with a mouth caked with clumping kitty litter (and BTs have vast mouths with a lot of lip and jowl to cake with that mess), looking appropriately contrite and ashamed (“Grimby, if you know it’s wrong, then why do you keep doing it?”).

He looks distinguished, but he eats poop. Any chance he gets.

Anyway, he’s gross because he’s a dog and dogs are gross. We’ve taken appropriate measures by investing in litterboxes he can’t get into. One is a covered box we turn so the cats can access, but Grim can’t. The other is what we call the Poogloo. It looks like an igloo, in which the cats can, well, you know.

Hermes has claimed the Poogloo for his own personal bathroom, which leaves Maui with the other covered one in the other bathroom. She seems to be okay with this, for the most part. But here’s the thing: While professing loudly to detest the dog, with much hissing and spitting from beneath the bed, I think she secretly has a crush on Grimby.

Here is my evidence: We’ve made it impossible for the dog to get into the litterboxes because it’s the most disgusting thing in the history of the world, or at least the part of the world located within our condo. Maui, in her infinite kindness (never thought I’d put that sentence together, if I’m being honest), likes to help a dog bro out, by pooping on the floor, approximately one foot to the right of the litterbox.

Thanks, Maui. You disgusting creature. It’s not bad enough you excrete swamp muck (seriously, the smell is unbearable), but you leave it, uncovered for the sniffing stank eater. And we only know from the evidence on the floor (you can use your imagination as to how we know. I’m not writing it out.).

There’s not really much rhyme or reason as to why or when she’ll become the gracious giver of dog treats. I suppose we should be grateful (Grimby clearly is). After all, this means the dog isn’t eating mouthfuls of clumping kitty litter, or “pee-flavoured sprinkles” as the sad dog reports, which means he’s less likely to drink a gallon of water, turning his intestines into a concrete mixer. Not even making this up—my dog has literally shat bricks.

So there you go. The politics of poop and why Maui isn’t our favourite cat.

Like this:

Okay, that’s not true. I’m not an officer of a long-since disbanded Roman army, maurauding the hilltops of the world as they knew it at the time. But I did just notice that, officially, The View From the Bay has reached one hundred (100!) posts and I feel like this is kind of a big deal.

Seeing as how I am the author of this blog, I feel a bit like I have commanded a regiment of one hundred rowdy rabblerousers over the years. After all, some of my posts have seemed to take on a life of their own, refusing to pay attention or follow my orders. They don’t always straighten up and fly right, you know.

One hundred. Wow. Time flies when you’re writing for fun! Thanks for reading!

I feel like I should celebrate. Nothing too fancy, of course. Maybe just a cake. This will do nicely:

Like this:

I was going to write about my ADHD tendencies, but once I started thinking about it, I just couldn’t stop other thoughts from flying in. And then I thought about cupcakes, which led to thoughts of ice cream. Ice cream is pretty much my favourite. Along with pie, but I canNOT go down that rabbit hole right now, or else I will just sit here salivating about cherry pie and get nothing done at all. It is pure coincidence that this image says pie. Or is it…?

Hi. Hi. Hi. Hi.

I still have a thing of peppermint candy ice cream left over from Christmas. It used to be called candy cane ice cream, but I think they got sued by the King of Christmas Candyland or something. Because now it is called peppermint candy ice cream, which is a much less exciting name. It still tastes like magical wonderfulrishical happiness, though! I get a tub of it every year from my wonderful in-laws. I have to work for it, though, lest you be thinking I’m the world’s luckiest girl (which I am, just for the record).

There might be a pretty ribbon I need to unwind and follow, or a riddle for me to solve. Each time, I run downstairs, check the deep freeze, hug my ice cream and replace it in the freezer, and then sprint back upstairs to announce that I had found nothing at all. “Nothing to see here, folks.” Certainly nothing that needed to be shared. Come ON: This kid wasn’t born yesterday!

Moving on, from ADHD (I’ll cover that one soon, I promise. Ooh, LOOK! Hermes…”), to cupcakes and then ice cream, to ZOKU! Ben and Ashley have this and I feel like we need it. Adam feels differently about this. Pshaw. You can make Christmas popsicles! Halloween popsicles! Disgusting popcorn-flavoured popsicles (buttered popcorn Jelly Bellies make me barf). These delicious treats (minus the popcorn ones) have their own blog! I could actually get this fun household necessity with the points from our credit card, for FREE. Or I could save up the points and get a food processor, which we actually need. Adam thinks I will only use the popsicle maker once.